Ready to Find the Kitchen Counter

I locked myself in the bathroom this morning. On purpose.

And I stayed there longer than I needed to, despite the urging of Wee Willie Winkie here, cragging at the locks and otherwise trying every trick at her disposal to lure me back onto the chaotic scene of the Last Day of Christmas Vacation.

I would describe my status today as READY to resume normal life, with two kids in school and the third with occasional morning parole.

While locked in the bathroom, I reached Day 79 of my Bible in 90 Days reading plan. I was supposed to have finished it on January 1, but the holiday season hit me like a big splashy tidal wave, and I missed a few weeks. Instead of being two days post-Revelation, I have just reached Acts.

I briefly considered allowing myself to feel overwhelmed and depressed about not finishing on time.

But you are likely thinking something more generous, and I have chosen to see the positives here as cause for celebration:

• I have come further than ever before in a Thru-the-Bible reading plan. 
• I finished the Old Testament before pausing. 
• I already know I am going to finish this time. 
• And I have already decided to do it again (a little slower) in 2011.

Reading through the Bible in the last few months, in this full-immersion way, has been life-changing. I cannot believe I have allowed so many periods of my life slip away without daily pouring its life-giving words on my dry soul. At all costs, I know this habit must continue.

This morning I stumbled across a fabulous idea to encourage me in my Bible reading: Just open the Bible and leave it out on the kitchen counter. Read a page or two here and there as time permits, just have that be the thing lying around to be read.

At the end of the excellent article proposing the Kitchen Counter method, was an alternate Bible reading method, for Shirkers and Slackers. Because it's usually the guilt of feeling like a slacker that keeps us from finishing what we have started, isn't it?

Or perhaps I just revealed a personal secret...

No. I do not believe I am alone in this. So for all my friends who fail often in their attempts to read the Bible, I present the Bible Reading Plan for Shirkers and Slackers.

Someday, I may try that plan. You may have noticed that it only requires a week-long commitment. However, during this season in my life, that's just not realistic.

Now, it's time to clear off the kitchen counter, to make room for my open Bible. Join me?

This post is linked up with On, In, and Around Mondays, as a chance to describe the place from which I see the world today. I suppose that place is the solitude of a tiny bathroom, in which certain truths achieve clarity.